


I'm Here

by Sailor Coruscant (Sailor_Coruscant)



Category: Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon (Live Action)
Genre: Character Study, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-12-25
Updated: 2010-12-25
Packaged: 2017-10-14 02:48:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,184
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/144523
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sailor_Coruscant/pseuds/Sailor%20Coruscant
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Minako's time is running out. But she'll go on, because it's her duty.</p>
            </blockquote>





	I'm Here

**Author's Note:**

  * For [VerboseWordsmith](https://archiveofourown.org/users/VerboseWordsmith/gifts).



> Unedited due to the last minute nature of the beast. Sorry for any small mistakes that have snuck through, I'll have it properly beta-read after the holidays.

Aino Minako is tired, and it’s starting to show in her performances. She knows this, and her Manager knows this, and maybe even some of the fans are starting to see, but when she meets up with Artemis after each show and interview, he tells her that she’s done well and relays the latest information about the enemy, the Princess, and where they have to go from here. Some nights they go after a new youma that Artemis has detected, others they have late appointments with her doctors and even more tests at the hospital, and every once in a while she checks in on Tsukino-san and her senshi, to be sure that they are still training hard to become the warriors she needs them to be.

Time is passing so quickly, more quickly than she had expected all those months ago when the second doctor confirmed the first’s diagnosis and Minako and Artemis had realised that they would need to revise their plans. That evening she donned the small silver crown that Artemis had retrieved from subspace for the first time and announced to the enemy that she was the reborn princess they’d been seeking. Later that night she’d read the article on Saitou Ace’s new movie, and resolved to become an idol to further her role as royal decoy.

It seemed like yesterday that Minako said goodbye to her parents, with backpack in hand and stuffed cat strapped to her shoulder. She had donned her largest sunglasses, which hid her tears as she whispered secret words into her compact and then left for the airport. In the taxi she was properly reborn as an idol making her debut on the mainland as an actress, playing a Chinese princess who rescues her criminal lover at the last moment. A part of Minako wondered at the time why the story in the scripts felt so familiar, but she was worn out and could not ask Artemis for advice while they were in such a public place. On the plane she realised it was probably something to do with her previous life, but once they arrived all such thoughts were forgotten in the drama of shooting.

Before she’d had a chance to appreciate the foreign countryside and language, they’d returned to Tokyo and Minako signed a contract with her current Manager, and then she had an album to record (who would have thought that all those hours in the karaoke booths with her friends so long ago would pay off?), and no one in her new circle of celebrity seemed to notice that her back story doesn’t make sense.

Tsukino-san and her friends haven’t realised the truth about their princess either, although sometimes Minako wonders if Hino-san suspects. And the enemy still believes she’s telling the truth; they haven’t even noticed that there isn’t a prince character like Tuxedo Kamen chasing after her yet. Maybe she could convince Artemis to play the role of the prince if such a thing is ever needed.

And so it goes on. Shooting commercials and films by day, fighting evil by night, and nothing really seems to change as Minako’s clock runs down, grains of sand trickling out of her life like her will to keep going. Her Manager nearly has a fit when she suggests the theme for her next few songs, because he doesn’t know that this next album is going to be her last and Minako is not sure she’ll ever be ready to tell him. He knows she’s sick, but not how bad things have become recently. One night when she has a few minutes spare and Artemis is "contacting the Boss" (more likely avoiding her foul mood), Minako sits outside to watch the stars move slowly overhead. She scribbles a few lines of poetry on a torn out page of her diary (these days she never wants to write for real, afraid that it might give away her secrets, or maybe reveal her true thoughts) and she resolves to send them to the composer of her songs, wondering if he’s able to do anything with them. Usually he ignores such notes, but tonight she just needs to feel that there could be a kernel of truth in her ramblings that is worth keeping alive.

Minako misses volleyball, and karaoke, and friendship and everything that was part of her life before she took on this role. Before she met Artemis and everything changed. Before she changed. She misses having a mother who soothed her when she was ill, placing cold cloths on feverish foreheads and warm blankets on shivering limbs. She misses having a father who laughed at her madcap adventures and bought her manga when her mother wasn’t watching.

Minako watches Tsukino-san and her friends meeting in Crown Karaoke on the security cameras the Boss set up and she hates them for their complacency and friendship. She dreams of a time when the four senshi and their princess were together the very best of friends, when battle was something they trained for, not a reality of daily life. Minako misses wearing her hair loose, she misses wearing a school uniform, she even misses her onee-san and her random offers of a part-time job at the police station. A part of Minako wonders if she would have taken her up on that offer if she had defeated the enemy before they were able to establish themselves so completely on this world it was her duty to protect.

But tomorrow Minako will go up on stage again, hiding the weariness behind a smile, and she’ll fight the another youma in the evening, though she wants to forget about everything and fall asleep. And the crowds will cheer, and the enemy will fall, and someday soon the true princess will reveal herself and Hino-san and the others will properly take up the fight to protect her and their world. So that Minako can be free to focus all her energy on the other battles before her. At least that’s what she tells herself when it all seems to be too hard.

Aino Minako knows her time is running out but she won’t cry, because she’s not that sort of person, and she doesn’t want Artemis, who is her only family, to know how brittle she is inside. She’s an idol with a big happy smile, a stuffed cat she takes with her everywhere and a red ribbon in her hair as a remembrance of her first First Love. Aino Minako is smart and funny, ever-ready with a joke to amuse her Manager, the directors and radio hosts, the fan interviews and the readers of her blog. She plays practical jokes on the assistants (never cruel ones, only silly tricks) and once asked the Prime Minister if he owned a copy of her first CD. Aino Minako is strong, she has never been weak, and she will always fighting any obstacles the universe throws her way.

But inside of her Kinno Minako sighs as she misses her family and friends, and hopes that her own time might resume.

**Author's Note:**

> This fic was inspired by a line in Minako's wikipedia entry that pointed out that she was the only one of the senshi who wasn't named after her planet, which lead me to a dark thought where she left her real name behind in order to protect her family and friends as she became a decoy for the princess. I hope you like it.


End file.
